Arkansas College

When Batesville lost its bid for the state university to Fayetteville, Presbyterian ministers built a college instead. Arkansas College opened in September 1872 and was coeducational from the start. In 1876 three women in its graduating class became, by the Encyclopedia of Arkansas's account, the first women in the state to earn a bachelor's degree. Isaac Long's son Eugene later served two terms as president, and in the early 1930s the Synod of Arkansas twice came within a few votes of closing the school. It took the name Lyon College in 1994.

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Old Independence Regional Museum — steps away
  A Batesville museum in a 1936 WPA sandstone National Guard armory, telling the story of the twelve counties that once formed Independence County, with a research wing for local records.
• Jacksonport State Park — 21 mi
  A steamboat port at the confluence of the White and Black rivers whose 1872 Second Empire courthouse, raised two feet to clear the floods, stands as the park museum.
• Greers Ferry Dam and Lake — 26 mi
  The Corps of Engineers dam on the Little Red River that President Kennedy dedicated on October 3, 1963, with a visitor center, a trout hatchery below the dam and a lake of 340 miles of shoreline.

More markers nearby

• Batesville During The Civil War — steps away
• Independence County First Court House — 0.4 mi
• Governor Elisha Baxter — 0.9 mi
• Three Governors of the State of Arkansas — 2.1 mi